Riverpiper Posted September 9, 2019 Share Posted September 9, 2019 The blur brush tool is behaving strangely. The selection circle is displayed and is normal when I move it over the image. When I click to work with it a checkered background appears within the circle. It also does not work. The same applies to sharpen and gaussian blur brush tools but strangely not smudge which works as normal. Does this mean a re-install? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted September 9, 2019 Share Posted September 9, 2019 A checkered background would suggest transparency. Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverpiper Posted September 9, 2019 Author Share Posted September 9, 2019 Yes it does, but this does not help me to resolve the issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walt.farrell Posted September 9, 2019 Share Posted September 9, 2019 So, to help further with resolving the issue, how about giving us some information to work with? For example, screenshots (including the photo and the Layers panel), or ideally a .afphoto file that we can look at? Also, what OS do you use, and what version of Photo? Quote -- Walt Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases PC: Desktop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Laptop: Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU. iPad: iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard Mac: 2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverpiper Posted September 9, 2019 Author Share Posted September 9, 2019 Hi Walt Attached is an example image with the 'offending' circle showing a transparency background. I'm using Photo version 1.7.4 with OS 10.14.6. Strange that this problem does not occur on the smudge brush tool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PixelPest Posted September 9, 2019 Share Posted September 9, 2019 May I ask where you got AP 1.7.4 from? Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Brighton Posted September 9, 2019 Share Posted September 9, 2019 1 hour ago, Riverpiper said: Attached is an example image with the 'offending' circle showing a transparency background. I'm using Photo version 1.7.4 with OS 10.14.6. Strange that this problem does not occur on the smudge brush tool. Could you post a concurrent screenshot of the colo(u)r tab configuration? Quote https://bmb.photos | Focus: The unexpected, the abstract, the extreme on screen, paper, & other physical output. Tools: macOS (Primary: Ventura, MBP2018), Canon (Primary: 5D3), iPhone (Primary: 14PM), Nikon Film Scanners, Epson Printers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pšenda Posted September 10, 2019 Share Posted September 10, 2019 6 hours ago, PixelPest said: May I ask where you got AP 1.7.4 from? Fast Ring? :-) Quote Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301 Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firstdefence Posted September 10, 2019 Share Posted September 10, 2019 1.7.4 = Typo Click on the more button this could have something to do with the brush settings more than the blur tool. Quote iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9 (Please refrain from licking the screen while using this forum) Affinity Help - Affinity Desktop Tutorials - Feedback - FAQ - most asked questions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Dan C Posted September 10, 2019 Staff Share Posted September 10, 2019 Hi Riverpiper Sorry to see you're having trouble! Could you please open Affinity Photo > Performance > Preferences and provide a screenshot of your settings here? Quote Please note - I am currently out of the office for a short while whilst recovering from surgery (nothing serious!), therefore will not be available on the Forums during this time. Should you require a response from the team in a thread I have previously replied in - please Create a New Thread and our team will be sure to reply as soon as possible. Many thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverpiper Posted September 10, 2019 Author Share Posted September 10, 2019 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Dan C Posted September 10, 2019 Staff Share Posted September 10, 2019 Thank you for that, and can you confirm is the issue only happening with the Preview of the blur tool? 14 hours ago, Riverpiper said: When I click to work with it a checkered background appears within the circle. It also does not work. I'm a little unsure due to the above sentence, however your second screenshot shows no transparent circle, so I suspect this is a current known issue which occurs when using Metal Compute. Could you please try unticking Enable Hardware Acceleration in your settings, restarting the app when prompted and try using these tools again? Quote Please note - I am currently out of the office for a short while whilst recovering from surgery (nothing serious!), therefore will not be available on the Forums during this time. Should you require a response from the team in a thread I have previously replied in - please Create a New Thread and our team will be sure to reply as soon as possible. Many thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverpiper Posted September 10, 2019 Author Share Posted September 10, 2019 Hi Dan Unticking Enable Hardware Acceleration has solved the problem. Thank's Can you tell me what Metal Compute is? Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Dan C Posted September 10, 2019 Staff Share Posted September 10, 2019 Glad to hear it, many thanks for letting me know! This is a bug our development team are aware of and we're working to fix this ASAP. Metal Compute is an architecture created by Apple to allow apps to utilise the Graphics Card in a Mac to provide the best performance possible, you can find out more about this here - https://developer.apple.com/metal/ As our implementation of Metal and Hardware Acceleration is still relatively new to us, this can occasionally cause rendering issues, such as the transparent preview of your Blur tool - I hope this clears things up Quote Please note - I am currently out of the office for a short while whilst recovering from surgery (nothing serious!), therefore will not be available on the Forums during this time. Should you require a response from the team in a thread I have previously replied in - please Create a New Thread and our team will be sure to reply as soon as possible. Many thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drmajorbob Posted December 7, 2019 Share Posted December 7, 2019 I have the same issues, and unclicking hardware acceleration doesn't make blur or median blur work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Dan C Posted December 9, 2019 Staff Share Posted December 9, 2019 Hi drmajorbob Sorry to hear this, could you please provide a screenshot of Affinity Photo with the Blur Brush tool selected? Quote Please note - I am currently out of the office for a short while whilst recovering from surgery (nothing serious!), therefore will not be available on the Forums during this time. Should you require a response from the team in a thread I have previously replied in - please Create a New Thread and our team will be sure to reply as soon as possible. Many thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scotchtape Posted December 16, 2019 Share Posted December 16, 2019 I have also found that the blur tool does not work. I have tried changing the settings for the brush--one poster suggested moving the "hardness" and "flow" sliders back and forth to get Affinity Photo "unstuck"--and toggling the lock next to the "(pixel)" line for the layer. However, even though the layer is set to pixel, I still can't get the blur tool to work no matter what. I've had to just use the rectangular selection tool and then blur the selection with a filter, but this is kludgy and not what I paid for this software to do. I am running Affinity Photo 1.7.3 on a Mac running Mojave. I recall that older versions of Affinity Photo seemed to have a blur tool that worked for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pšenda Posted December 17, 2019 Share Posted December 17, 2019 For me work fine. Quote Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301 Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155. Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff MEB Posted December 17, 2019 Staff Share Posted December 17, 2019 Hi Scotchtape, Welcome to Affinity Forums We are aware of a few issues with the Blur Tool on macOS. Do you mind replying a few questions please? 1. Does the brush cursor displays as an empty/transparent circle after you lay down the first stroke as shown in the screenshot in the 4th post of this thread? 2. if you perform multiples passes (click and drag several times) on the same area does it start getting blurry (move the slider in the History panel back and forward to check if there was changes). It's possible the brush is actually working but the output is quite subtle and only visible after multiple passes (even with Opacity, Flow and Hardness set to 100% in the context toolbar for the Blur Brush Tool) - can you confirm this please? Note: It should work correctly for you if you disable/untick Metal Compute acceleration in Affinity Photo Preferences, Performance section (on bottom of the panel - you will have to restart Affinity Photo for the new setting take effect). Quote A Guide to Learning Affinity Software | Affinity Quick Reference Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tudor Posted January 24, 2020 Share Posted January 24, 2020 Is this issue still being addressed? I've just bumped into it (blur tool not working, checkerboard pattern on cursor until I disable the Metal Compute acceleration) in 1.73 and 1.8 beta. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverpiper Posted January 24, 2020 Author Share Posted January 24, 2020 Thanks to everyone who replied. Problem now resolved. Dan C 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdvoracek Posted March 23, 2020 Share Posted March 23, 2020 On 9/10/2019 at 6:14 AM, Dan C said: Glad to hear it, many thanks for letting me know! This is a bug our development team are aware of and we're working to fix this ASAP. Metal Compute is an architecture created by Apple to allow apps to utilise the Graphics Card in a Mac to provide the best performance possible, you can find out more about this here - https://developer.apple.com/metal/ As our implementation of Metal and Hardware Acceleration is still relatively new to us, this can occasionally cause rendering issues, such as the transparent preview of your Blur tool - I hope this clears things up Affinity Photo 1.8.2 same issue resolved by disabling that hardware acceleration. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quasiDigi Posted March 26, 2020 Share Posted March 26, 2020 On 3/23/2020 at 3:04 AM, jdvoracek said: Affinity Photo 1.8.2 same issue resolved by disabling that hardware acceleration. Same here Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jamesKRK Posted May 30, 2020 Share Posted May 30, 2020 For me blur brush does very little difference, and hardness or opacity if it is 10 or 100 % doesn't make any difference. I'm using 1.8.3 mac os, tried everything above. Any solutions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff MEB Posted June 1, 2020 Staff Share Posted June 1, 2020 Hi jamesKRK, Welcome to Affinity Forums Thanks for your feedback. What's the size of the image you are working with (px)? If you disable/untick Enable Metal compute acceleration in Affinity Photo Preferences, Performance section does it work as expected for you (clearly visible blur)? Quote A Guide to Learning Affinity Software | Affinity Quick Reference Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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